Previous: Inadequate Equilibria
I have to admit I know nothing about this topic, however, it is, as far as I can say, one of the weirdest and most interesting recent developments in physics. It is also closely linked to computer science. Yet, I don't see it discussed in programming community at all.
The idea is that, somehow, nature may be fundamentally limited in its computational capacity. That, in other words, it's not possible to compute NP-complete problems in polynomial time and that the hurdle is not some kind of technical problem but rather that uncomputability of such problems is a fundamental principle of physics.
Sounds like a hallucination by a computer science professor? Well, given that an accomplished physicist, such as Leonard Susskind is willing to take it seriously maybe it is not.
And, by the way, if I had to choose between a universe with limited computational power and a universe with limited amount of certainty, the former sounds much less wacky.
In any case, watch the video and wonder: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boZyu6NhAcI
Martin Sústrik, December 7th, 2017
Previous: Inadequate Equilibria
Perhaps, we could fork the universe by creating a portal to the past.
To resolve the paradox of killing my own grandfather, when I create a portal to the past, a copy of the universe of the past could be created.
If my guess was correct and we could create pocket universes containing a lifeless solar system, in theory, we would gain access to unlimited amount of energy and computational power. Everyone could fork and own their own pocket universes.
We can bypass heat death in this way, too.
Except that no and that's the very point. If you think about quantum computing in terms of many-words hypothesis, you can be led to thinking that it's garnering its computational power from alternate universes. However, for all we know, it is still not able to cope with NP-complete problems. There's something strange and interesting going on there.
I consider my theory as just one of many possible theories.
As far as I know, many-worlds hypothesis allows alternate universes to not be able to interact with each other. Perhaps, you need a warm hole or a portal to interact with alternate universes.
Forking the universe of the past by opening a portal to the past is not necessarily the same as natural forking at the present moment without leaving a portal behind.
All I'm saying is that nobody knows for sure.
See 53:00 in the video on the topic.
From 53:00, the video basically seems to say the quantum computers should be able to draw energy from other universes or use other universes to solve NP-complete problems, but they don't solve those problems.
I didn't watch further because I am not good at physics and the video seemed to digress from that point.
That physicists don't know yet why the current generations of quantum computers cannot solve NP-complete problems raises more questions. There are still rooms for wild speculations.
People are still figuring out how to make quantum computers work, and they don't know much about quantum computing, yet.
I think it's too early to conclude that there is no multiverse or we cannot harness the energy of other universes or do any other crazy things with the universe. Even, heat death is still a speculation at this moment. It might be big crunch that is waiting for us.
If you prove that nature is fundamentally limited in its computational capacity, the space is probably finite.
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